


the darker the night, the brighter the stars

by flamingosarepink



Category: The Goldfinch (2019), The Goldfinch - Donna Tartt
Genre: And they are happy together!, Boris still works in art crime though, In Antwerp of course, Like finding incredibly incredibly famous stolen art things, M/M, Theo works at an art auction house, They've kind of gotten their lives together!, and then things happen!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-11
Updated: 2019-08-11
Packaged: 2020-08-18 23:37:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,754
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20200072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flamingosarepink/pseuds/flamingosarepink
Summary: Boris for the most part, had managed to get his life together as well, but an unsettling fact that still distressed me greatly was the fact that he still ran in the same circles he used to that dealt in stolen art- the very art I had made my living on.





	the darker the night, the brighter the stars

**Author's Note:**

> I've had this idea for a few months, and it wouldn't leave me alone! The title is from Crime and Punishment.

Somehow, I had managed to get my life together. I had taken the necessary classes, kicking the drug habits. Working my up at a top auction house. Risen to become head of the Old Masters department. It had been somewhat of a surprise to some I worked with that this had turned out to be the case- recalling a report that revealed Old Masters were losing their value simply because of the fact that there weren’t many people interested in them. Scholars had passed away, leaving no real authorities on the subject. But here I was, making a living for myself at something I was passionate about. I had become someone that my mother would be proud of.

If only she could see me now. 

Along with the perks of the job, came the money I had made. Along the way, I had made enough to pay Hobie back for my misdeeds courtesy of a few lucrative deals. I bought a Summer flat in Antwerp -where the auction house had a branch- of all places, a cozy and spacious place with original wooden beams in the living room that made me think of what it could have been in the old days. In the midst of all these things I’d managed for myself however was one thing I hadn’t managed to abandon, and that was Boris. 

Boris for the most part, had managed to get his life together as well, but an unsettling fact that still distressed me greatly was the fact that he still ran in the same circles he used to that dealt in stolen art- the very art I had made my living on. The very art that I loved. It was the one blemish on our relationship I could do absolutely nothing about. _You bring anything into my house ever again Boris, and I swear I’m leaving you and calling the police._ was what I had told him on the occasion when he dared bring in a Degas, a beautiful little painting of a chorus on a stage with vibrant pops of orange and red, for safekeeping in a cupboard that held many year in review books and logs of collections i’d helped sell from work. Namely, a place no one but me would find it. Only that I had found it. _I promise never to do it again, Potter._ At the use of that old childhood nickname, I felt my anger and stress level deflate. Since then, he’d never included me in on what he did with any of the paintings that came into his hands. A year after, that very same Degas was found abandoned in a suitcase that had been left on a bus which had been parked outside a rest area outside Paris, in Seine-et-Marne. The French Culture minister at the time had hailed it as a ‘rediscovery of a precious work belonging to the national collections, the disappearance of which represented a heavy loss for French impressionist heritage.’ With that, I found myself feeling elated inside. The painting was back where it belonged and out of my orbit. 

That however, ended one Summer morning at the beginning of August. I had decided to spend a week or two back in Antwerp, a week or two away from the hustle and bustle of New York City. Boris, naturally had decided to come with me. I didn’t object to it whatsoever. 

“I need your help with something.” He had said seriously just as we had sat down for breakfast. Boris was never entirely serious. 

“Boris-“ I was about to refuse. I knew exactly where this was going to lead. I closed my eyes and inhaled sharply, in that way I did now when I felt my stress level creep up like a horror movie jump scare. He stopped me with a reach across the table to lightly squeeze my fingers, looking at me in a tender way. 

“No, no. It’s quite a simple manner. One of my associates thinks he is being swindled, and told me to find someone who knows what they’re looking at. You go in, you look, that’s it.” 

I felt his thumb begin to swipe across my knuckles, and suddenly my eyes were opening to glance at him. This was almost entirely too much for me to handle. 

“Okay, fine. How far away are we going?” I asked, watching him get up from his place across from me at the table to take our plates to the sink. 

“You won’t even have to leave the city.” He replied as I found myself glad this wouldn’t turn into another multi-country adventure.

\- - - - 

As it turned out, the location was in walking distance from my flat. 

Boris had taken me to Stoelstraat, one of the oldest streets in Antwerp. I almost felt like I was walking back in time just being there, and temporarily found myself distracted by the charming nature of the old houses. But my mind, often used to looking for imperfections in paintings which might reveal them as fakes or by some lesser artist, found this a rather odd place for us to be given the nature of our visit. Not far down the way which we had taken was the canal, a theatre and a cafe packed with people. This was in plain sight practically, although where we had taken a turn was almost deserted save for ourselves. It was quiet, peaceful and away from any prying eyes. 

We stopped in front of a house that while it still looked old, was different from all of the other houses and reminded me more of a canal house one would see back in Amsterdam- brick almost orange colored accented by white stone window sills, complete with an arched doorway that was accented by a dark wooden door. The window sills were closed from the view of anyone by wooden shutters. Something about this was off about this, but I couldn’t quite figure it out. 

Boris knocked on the door, which quickly opened. Once we walked inside, the cold of the air conditioning hitting me in the face the minute we entered made me shiver or maybe it was the shock of what I immediately saw. The sound of Boris exchanging pleasantries with an older woman who I found myself not caring about as the door shut behind us was blocked out.

There were paintings everywhere, piled high in their frames in stacks around the room or in packing tubes rolled up. No rhyme or reason was there to anything about this. I find myself further more horrified at the sight on what I recognize from my days working in furniture with Hobie as a 15th century wooden table. Under the kind of big magnifying glass you might see in a lab, is a heavily fire damaged canvas. In its condition, I can barely make out the face of a young man with shoulder length hair and an intelligent face. Almost sensing my horror, I feel lithe fingertips on my wrist urging me forward accompanied by a gentle voice. “Theo, this way.” Somehow, I find it in myself to follow Boris and the woman.

Not much better is the back room farthest in the house. Paintings are still stacked everywhere, but in less quantity. The woman, who I now notice has her greying blond hair pulled back in a ponytail, directs us to some works on another table, far less old than the one up front. They are all small, not huge or likely to have any place of prominence in a museum. One I recognize as a still life with mainly flowers by Willem van Aelst, the other a picturesque Ruisdael landscape that in any other situation would inspire calm in me. Next was a beautiful portrait of a woman in fine clothes by Jan Lievens. “You said there was a fourth one,” Boris inquired once I said nothing establishing them as outright fakes or not by that particular artist. 

“Yes, yes. It’s this one here…” The woman’s high heels clicked as she walked across the room to retrieve a larger packing tube. 

She returned to the table, having cleared off the other paintings in preparation. As she took the painting out of the tube and rolled it out, I felt my heart stop the moment I saw the white seafoam crashing into a tiny boat. Even in its sorry state, the painting was the most beautiful thing I had ever laid eyes on. I didn’t need a magnifying glass to see the man bracing against the rope with one hand and holding his pink hat on his head of red hair with the other. I knew I was looking at The Storm on the Sea of Galilee, the only seascape painted by Rembrandt which had been stolen from the Gardner in Boston in 1990. Everything about it was unmistakable, and for the first time in a long while I heard that tell-tale ringing in my ears. My balance felt off. Boris stepped closer to me, placing a hand on the small of my back. Seeming to sense the turn things had taken he thanked the woman for her time and once we were out of the house and back out onto the street heading in the direction we came, I felt a hand between my shoulder blades. We both stopped walking abruptly. 

“Theo. Please look at me.” I felt bad for worrying him. 

I let out a breath I found I had been holding and in the back of my mind I heard my mother’s voice, telling me to do the right thing. Telling me that I knew what I needed to do. I looked up from the stone of the street to Boris’s face. He smiled softly, and I returned it as much I could muster. 

Exhaustion began to set in, and miraculously we made it home at which point I lost track of the time between when we walked in and when I collapsed into our bed.

When I woke, it was still daylight. My head hurt. The bedroom was dark except for the light filtering in from the narrow slit where the curtains didn’t touch. I could hear the faint sound of Boris talking on the phone from the kitchen even though the bedroom door was closed. Reaching for my phone on the nightstand, I dialed a number I had memorized from a paper on my desk back at work. _Your call will remain anonymous,_ the automated voice declared.

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was very much so started into motion by the fact that I was thinking about what if The Storm On the Sea Of Galilee had been recovered, and given that I had read The Goldfinch the year before I thought about this being the perfect setting for me to write a fic about that. As well, the setting for where the painting was found was very much so inspired by how they found the paintings in the Gurlitt Art Hoard a few years ago. Also worth mentioning is that the badly damaged canvas featured on the table is a once thought lost Self Portrait of Carel Fabritius which survived the explosion of Delft which dates from before he joined Rembrandt's studio. It is indeed real and not something I made up- a man that I follow on Twitter who authenticates art for a living had the privilege of working with it. I wrote that in as a sort of nod to the book. Another real thing that I added in was the Degas featured at the beginning. It is indeed real as well as the way it was found.


End file.
